House surveys in Cumbria

Cumbria, now governed as Cumberland and Westmorland and Furness, has some of the most varied housing in England. The Lake District is built of slate and local stone, with whitewashed cottages, Victorian villas and many listed buildings, while Carlisle and the Eden Valley use red sandstone. West Cumbria's coal, iron and port towns of Whitehaven and Workington and the shipbuilding town of Barrow-in-Furness have brick and stone terraces. Common survey issues include river flooding, made worse by the storms of 2005, 2009 and 2015, penetrating damp in solid stone walls exposed to heavy rainfall, radon in parts of the county, historic coal and haematite mining in the west and Furness, and local occupancy restrictions on some homes in the National Park.